Bilingual parents' language use in child-directed
speech: four case studies of English-Finnish bilingual parents
Mia Morris & Anna-Maija Korpijaakko-Huuhka, University of Helsinki, Finland
Abstract
An
increasing number of children in
Introduction
During the last few decades the number of
people living in
Bilingual parents' language use
Definitions of bilingualism vary, and in
addition to language proficiency, they take into consideration the means and
time of language acquisition, as well as the relationship between the two
languages, and the cultural and linguistic identity of the individual (see Hoffman
1991 for an overview). In communication, a bilingual person will choose which
language to use, depending on factors such as the situation, the interlocutors'
language proficiency, the topic or force of habit (Grosjean 1982, 136). A
bilingual person may also switch between languages, especially in conversation
with other bilinguals. Language switching can be used as a pragmatic means of
communication, through which the speaker can, for example, address a turn to a certain
person, express humor or indicate social status (Grosjean 1982, 152). Language
switching can also fill a linguistic need, and it may triggered by the last
language used. The amount of language switching depends on language proficiency
as well as attitudes towards language switching (Grosjean 1982, 149–156; Ng
& He 2004). A bilingual child's language use (language separation in
output) and language development, especially in the minority language, is
affected by the parent's language use and the usage of different communicative
strategies. Through these strategies the parent may demonstrate to the child
either that he/she may speak either language or that the child is expected to
attempt speaking a specific language with the parent (Lanza 1992; Juan-Garau
& Perez-Vidal 2001).
In research on early bilingualism, the one
parent-one language -method has traditionally been considered the best way to
achieve bilingualism (see Leopold 1954; Volterra & Taeschner 1980). In this
model, both parents are supposed to consistently speak only their own language to
the child. However, consistency in language use is difficult in varying
situations and with different people (Arnberg 1979; Goodz 1989). In addition, parents
also seem to be quite unaware of language switching in child-directed speech
(Goodz 1989; Genesee, Nicoladis & Paradis 1995). In bilingual parents'
child-directed speech, switching between languages may serve functions such as
promoting the child's communicativeness or teaching the child certain things,
for example manners or translation equivalents for words (Garcia 1980; Lanza
2004, 271, 294; Pavlenko 2004). Language switching may also serve social and
pragmatic functions, such as including other people in the conversation. It is
also important to note that the one parent-one language -model in itself may
not lead to active bilingualism; as the child develops, the majority language
often becomes dominant, and the child may have only a passive command in the
minority language (see Arnberg 1979; Juan-Garau & Perez-Vidal 2001).
A bilingual child's use of languages and
language development are shaped by the parent's language use and usage of
strategies, through which the parent consciously or subconsciously indicates
how he/she wishes the child to use the languages (Lanza 2004, 262). In response
to a child's language mixing, parents may switch languages themselves, continue
communication in their own language or recast the child's mixed turn in their
own language, providing the child translation equivalents (Lanza 1992).
However, parents may also "guess" the content of the child's turn in
their own language or pretend not to understand the child's utterance, and thus
communicate to the child that he/she must repair the turn or attempt speaking
the appropriate language. These responses form a continuum from a bilingual
context to a monolingual context; the parent's own switched turn represents the
most bilingual response, and initiating a repair sequence indicates the most
monolingual strategy (Lanza 2004, 268).
A two-year-old child's pragmatic development
allows the child to comprehend explicit strategies, such as requesting that the
child say something in a certain language or "like mommy says it" or
offering the child translation equivalents in recasts (Kasuya 1998). On the
other hand, implicit strategies, such as pretending not to understand what the
child says, may not be understood because a child's pragmatic skills may not be
developed enough: prior to the age of three, the child may not understand that a
breakdown in communication may be caused by language choice instead of
imperfections in the child's articulation or factors such as the parent not
hearing what the child said (Genesee, Boivin & Nicoladis 1996; Nicoladis
& Secco 2000). Some two-year-olds, however, are capable of comprehending
implicit strategies (Lanza 1992; Juan-Garau & Perez-Vidal 2001). In
reviewing prior studies, it seems that children, to whom an active language
distinction has been taught through explicit strategies
can already interpret the implicit before the age of three (see Garcia 1980;
Döpke 1992; Lanza 2004, 280).
Aims of the study
The aims of this study were to investigate 1)
how four English-Finnish bilingual parents described their methods of bilingual
upbringing, 2) how the parents used their languages and different context
negotiation strategies with their two-to-three-year-old child in two different
situations, 3) and how their own description of their method of upbringing
matches the findings from video data.
Method
Four English and Finnish-speaking bilingual
parents (see Table 1) took part in the study. The parents all lived in
Table 1. Subjects
|
Name
(alias) |
Age (years) |
Main
language of use |
Type of
bilingualism |
Language of
other parent |
|
Tanja |
28 |
Finnish |
successive |
English |
|
Mark |
25 |
English |
successive |
Finnish |
|
Sara |
26 |
English |
simultaneous |
Finnish |
|
Laura |
34 |
Finnish |
successive |
English |
Interactions
between the parents and the children were videotaped in the dyad and in a
family situation, in which the child's other parent was also present. The data
were transcribed and analysed by adapting the conventions of conversation
analysis (see Heritage 1984). In the analysis, the parent's language switching
and her/his reactions to the child's language mixing were examined over the
conversational unit of turn at talk. A turn at talk was
defined as a prosodic and semantic entity distinguished from other turns by a
pause or by another person's conversational turn (see Sacks, Schegeloff
& Jefferson 1974). Spontaneous language switching by the parent was given
its own code (A). The parent's reactions after the child's language mixing were
categorized according to the codes in Table 2. The codes constitute a
continuum, in which 0 indicates the most monolingual context and 5 and A the
most bilingual context (cf. Lanza 2004, 268).
Table 2. The continuum of
communication behavior and strategies implying a monolingual or a bilingual
context
|
Code |
Description |
|
0 |
The parent
ignores the child's mixed turn or responds in a very minimal way, for example
by nodding |
|
1 |
Minimal
grasp: The parent initiates a repair sequence in response to child language
mixing |
|
2 |
Expressed
guess: The parent "guesses" the content of the child's mixed turn |
|
3 |
The parent
repeats the child's mixed utterance in his/her own matrix language |
|
4 |
The parent
takes account of the mixed turn and carries on communication in matrix
language or non-verbally |
|
5 |
The parent
switches languages in response to child language mixing |
|
A |
A
spontaneous, parent-initiated language switch |
In addition to collecting video data, a
semi-structured interview was conducted to investigate the parent's own
conceptions of her/his language use. Interviews were aimed at collecting
detailed information about the model of bilingual upbringing employed. This
data was finally compared with the observations from video material.
Results
All four bilingual parents clearly had one main
language of use, but each of them also used the other language with the child
during the video recordings. Two parents adhered quite strictly to using only
one language, switching languages in less than 5 % of their turns at talk in
both the dyad and the family situation. The other two, however, switched more
freely between languages, one switching in about 10 percent of her turns and
the other in a substantial 30 percent of her turns at talk. Parents did not,
however, switch languages in a haphazard manner; language switching occurred in
reaction to child-initiated language switches, manifested a use of
"personal loans", i.e. consistently employed borrowed words with
equivalents in the other language, or served pragmatic functions, such as
displaying humor or parental authority.
In the dyad, two parents used strategies to
indicate a monolingual context, while in the family situation all parents
indicated a bilingual context with their child. All the parents maintained a
bilingual context with their child in the family situation by continuing communication
in their own language or by switching languages in reaction to the child's
language mixing. However, differences were noted in the dyad situation, in which
two parents kept up a bilingual context, while the other two expressed an
aspiration towards a monolingual context, mainly by reacting minimally to the
child's mixed turns, but also by offering the child translation equivalents for
mixed words.
The parents reported aiming to use mainly one
language with the child, but said they used the other language from time to
time. Three of the four parents, including both the parents
who switched more freely between languages, described language switching with
the child as "slip-ups". All the parents described their
reactions to the child's language mixing in different ways, and three of them
said that they responded in their own language usually or often. Only one
parent reported using different strategies towards child language mixing in the
dyad compared to the family situation.
The parents’ descriptions of their own language
use matched well with the findings from the video data, with the exception of
one English-speaking parent, who consistently used certain Finnish words as
"personal loans", i.e. she used the words consistently (see
Myers-Scotton 1992), and did not use their translation equivalents. The
personal loans included words like mommy (äiti) and daddy (isi),
and also a group of particles used as pragmatic rather than semantic units in
discourse, such as yeah (joo), oops (oho), and okay
(noin/noni). In her case the findings from the video material did not
match her own description of her language use, as her language switching was
more frequent than she expressed. Three of the parents' descriptions of their
reactions to child language mixing were similar to observations made from the
video data, including one of the parents who used monolingual strategies in the
dyad. The study indicates that some bilingual parents are capable of giving
quite precise estimations of the amount of language switching in child-directed
speech, and describing their reactions to child language mixing.
Discussion
Individual differences were evident in the
parents' models of bilingual upbringing. In the amount of language switching,
the parents' own assessments of their language proficiency played a great role.
The amount of code-switching was clearly affected by the parents' own
acceptance of switching languages (see also Ng & He 2004), as well as the parents'
habits of language use. Personal habits were evident especially in the case of
an English-speaking parent who quite consistently used certain Finnish words
and discourse particles. It is probable that she did not view discourse
particles as language choice items. The family's habits were evident in the
case of familial loans for discourse particles No trends between the educational
level of the parents and the amount of language switching were apparent in this
small group (vs. Arnberg 1979).
Research (Lanza 1992; Juan-Garau &
Perez-Vidal 2001) has shown that using strategies that imply a monolingual
context promotes the child's active usage of the appropriate language and
consequently the development of that language. In this study, implicit
monolingual strategies, such as reacting very minimally to the child's turn,
did not usually lead the child into using the target language, perhaps because
of the child's young age (2 years and 3 months) (see also Nicoladis &
Genesee 1998; Nicoladis & Secco 2000), gaps in the child's vocabulary (Quay
1995; Genesee ym. 1996; Nicoladis & Secco 2000), or the fact that the
reactions had yet to become well-established enough in the parents'
communication for the child to be able to act accordingly (see Lanza 2004,
269). More explicit strategies, such as offering the child translation
equivalents, and recasting the child's utterance in the target language, led
the children to use the appropriate language on a few occasions (see also
Kasuya 1998).
The methods and results of this study help
develop more accurate evaluation and comprehension of the language contexts of
a bilingual child. This study provides knowledge through which people who
interact and work with bilingual children can have a better understanding of a
bilingual child's language development. It may also help professionals who work
with bilingual children, for example speech and language therapists, in
carrying out more accurate assessment and collecting more precise information about
the child's developmental language contexts and, if need be, in guiding the
child's parents and other care-givers in matters of language use.
Further studies on the long-term effect of
using different communication strategies with children acquiring two languages
are necessary. Also, the possible advantages of using context-negotiation
strategies with children at risk of losing their first language, for example
due to a drastic reduction in the amount of first language stimulus, need to be
evaluated. Children with language impairments are especially vulnerable to
reductions in the amount of exposure to their languages (Salameh, Håkanson
& Nettelblad 2004). Thus research is also needed to study if there are any
benefits of including explicit and implicit monolingual strategies in the
communication habits of different caretakers of a bilingual child with language
impairments.
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Key words:
bilingualism, language choice, language use,
parent-child interaction, code switching.